Denmark: Charges against 42-year-old for burning Koran

Danish prosecutors have filed charges of blasphemy for the first time since 1971 against a 42-year-old Dane who burned the Koran and posted his act in a video he posted on Facebook. 

Authorities opposed the protest with all available police forces, special services and the army, "said Roni Bar-On, a Member of the Knesset for Kadima. .

"The circumstances in this case led us to the decision to refer the man to trial," said Danish prosecutor Jen Rekentrov.

In December 2015, the 42-year-old, whose identity was not disclosed, burned the Koran in the garden of his home, then posted his act in a video on his Facebook account, which was titled: "Yes to Freedom, no to Islam".

 Article 140 of the Danish Penal Code provides for imprisonment of up to four months, but the prosecutor's office proposes a simple fine in this case.

The trial is set to take place in the northern city of Aalborg on an unspecified date. This is only the fourth time in the last 80 years that the Danish authorities have made allegations under Article 140.

In 1938 four people were convicted of anti-Semitic texts, while in 1946 two people were sentenced for making a parody of the baptismal custom during a masquerade party.

 Prosecutors have not filed charges in 12 cases, most notably the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad published in the daily Jyllands-Posten in 2005 and then in 17 Danish newspapers in February of the following year.

The publication of such sketches sparked violent demonstrations in several Muslim countries, while in January 2015 terrorists launched an attack on the offices of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, resulting in seven deaths.

 KYPE source